Ranchi, Feb. 19: The 10 students of Cambridge Institute of Technology (CIT) against whom FIRs were lodged yesterday for ragging and beating up juniors were actually trying to protect their classmates against eve-teasing.

The fact came to light this afternoon when 25 girls of the 2007 batch turned up before investigating officer sub-inspector (SI) Ram Raj Singh and told him how their juniors — Jivesh Kumar and Vikas Kumar — had made vulgar passes at them on Tuesday.

"We were coming out of the examination hall at Suraj Singh Memorial College when they made vulgar comments. First, we ignored them, but later had to inform our hostel superintendent," one of the girls said. She, however, clarified that they had not instigated any of their classmates to beat up the juniors.

Singh had today visited the campus to investigate the matter along with officer in charge of Tatisilwai Bipin Kumar Singh. When the eve-teasing angle was revealed, CIT chairman Bahadur Singh and principal A. Bhattacharya said they were unaware.

The college has already issued transfer certificates to all 10 students involved in case. The institute chairman said they were punished as their names had appeared in a ragging FIR.

"If the allegation of eve-teasing is found to be true, action will also be taken against Jivesh and Vikas," he said.

The students against whom transfer certificates have been issued could not be contacted for comments.

SI Singh said seven of the 10 were arrested, but later released on personal bond as the FIR was lodged under bailable sections — 147 (rioting), 342 (unlawful confinement) and 323 (voluntarily causing hurt). "We do not have any idea where they went after being released," he said.source

Singh said seven out of 10 students against whom the FIRs were lodged were arr- ested and later released on personal bonds. He refused to divulge further informa- tion stating that the matter was under investigation.

Sources said that the boys who were ragged, including Vikas Kumar and Jivesh Kumar, both second year students, were dragged by their seniors from their room and then beaten black and blue for more than two hours with belt and iron rods.

"The juniors were called by their seniors for a meeting. When they refused to come out saying that they were preparing for their examinations, the seniors dragged them out from their room and took them to their room and started assaulting them.

"The beating continued till the boys became unconscious," an institute stud- ent said, requesting anonymity.

Cambridge Institute of Technology director, Bahadur Singh, was not available for comment.

Cambridge Institute of Technology sources said the director had asked the dis- ciplinary committee of the institute to investigate the matter.source

Apple may have had more than its share of the limelight, but a team of India's finest geeks are taking aim at its prima donna. They want to be India's first complete product company, and are starting first, with Adam

The iPad may have whet the consumer's appetite for tablet PCs, by the end of this year he can expect to be spoiled for choice. Major manufacturers plan to follow suit with tablet implementations of their own: The HP slate and the Lenovo U1 Hybrid will run Windows 7 and have more in common with a traditional laptop, while Dell and Archos will be based on Google's Android operating system. But most promising of all, is a Hyderabad-based company called Notion Ink, which has already made waves at CES 2010 with the Adam tablet.

Adam will be the first device to use Pixel QI's transflective display, which can function in two modes: In the black and white mode, it consumes very low power and can be read in bright sunlight. This mode will help the Adam tablet function as an e-reader, like the Amazon Kindle, but the device can also switch to full colour mode, where it can use nVidia's Tegra2 processor to play rich 3D games and high definition movies at 1080p.

"The possibilities are enormous. It has GPU which can allow high definition gaming, it has special screen will makes it an e-reader as well. It is Wi-Fi enabled, so it's an internet-at-go device too." said Rohan Shravan, founder of Notion Ink.

On the Adam, the power-efficient Tegra 2 chipset promises to deliver 16 hours of high definition video, and 160 hours in E-ink mode on a single charge. It will also have a swivel camera that will allow users to use the device as a web cam and a camera. The Adam will also support popular media formats, and will have an HDMI and three USB ports, and can be used like a mini-desktop with a port each, for a mouse, keyboard and external storage. The tablet runs on Google's Android OS, but has a completely redesigned user interface.

Notion Ink has done collaborative work with National Institute of Design, Research and Development Campus at Bangalore to define the elements of the operating system, internally codenamed "Pamphilus" .

The company aims to launch the product in India between second and third quarter 2010. While its founders cannot fully commit to a price point, it is unlikely to be retailed at Rs 15,000. "It is unlikely that Adam will retail for $327, as internet rumours will have you believe" said Rajat Sahni, Director, Business and Partner Development at Notion Ink. "However, the Adam will not demand a 40 per cent margin; as we do not see this as a premium device." He added.

"As a kid, I wanted to learn a lot of things. But I belonged to a lower-middle class family. Now, I've the opportunity to create an enabler which will realise the dreams of kids like me." says Rohan Shravan, founder of Notion Ink in the Notion Ink blog. We rarely hear of an Indian company making waves in the world of consumer electronics.

Notion Ink has been quietly working away at this concept since 2007. Starting off as a team of Six IITians and one MBA grad, the founders believe that they can take on the best of the companies in the world. "We wanted to design the product ourselves – internal hardware integration, operating system personalisation, and build a touch user interface that would tie it all together." said Rohan.

Adam will launched first in US and other markets. The Indian edition of the Adam tablet will not be 3G enabled: "Practically speaking, there is no 3G in India, so we won't be using a 3G module in a region that is so sensitive to price." said Rohan.

Notion Ink will be showing off a functional prototype of Adam this month at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

Jamshedpur, Feb. 7: NIT in Melbourne race - They are fast and fabulous. And in top gear for Formula SAE Design Challenge 2010, scheduled in Melbourne, Australia, later this year.

The drift racing team of NIT, Adityapur, whose DR110 model bagged third prize at the SAE-sponsored racing car meet in Chennai last December, are now busy upgrading their bright red speedster, which was the biggest draw at Enterprise Jharkhand, the industry and technology fair that concluded at Gopal Maidan today.

"Our team of 10 has now increased to 16. We are putting in our best efforts. Ours is the first formula car from the eastern region of the country. For the December event in Melbourne, we have already spoken to sponsors," said Uttam Kumar, a second-year student.

The budding engineers have decided to upgrade the 150cc engine to 600cc, which they have to import at a cost of Rs 2.25 lakh. This will increase the speed to 180kmph.

The steering will also be upgraded from manual to "sensitive", which is several notches above power steering.

The chassis of the car is made up of steel tubes while the body is of fibre glass. Att present, the petrol-driven car can travel 20km a litre and has a fuel capacity of 10 litres. The mileage will be improved.

"We have noted some 14 changes that need to be made.. Our aim is racing safe," said Saikat Sardar, another member of the design team.

According to him, the current cost is Rs 3.12 lakh, but once modified, the car will be worth Rs 7 lakh.

Last time, the NIT students had managed to rope in a number of corporate houses. This time, however, they only have Tata Steel, which has agreed to sponsor Rs 5 lakh.

The institute approached the CII for displaying the racing car at the fair so that they could draw the attention of more sponsors.source

Scoring 796 on a scale of 1,000, the all-terrain vehicle developed by 17 mechanical engineering students of Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad, steered ahead of most rivals to bag the second prize at the Asia-level JK Tyre Baja SAE INDIA 2010 contest at Pitampura, Indore, last month.

Today, it was put on display at the annual alumni meet of the institute, Basant 2010, to celebrate a much-deserved victory.

The three-day Asia-level event — from January 29 to 31 — saw more than 80 technical institutes from across the country, including IITs and NITs, participating.

The ISM team, which pocketed a cash prize of Rs 3 lakh, trailed Maharastra Institute of Technology (MIT), Aurangabad, that posted a win with 798 points.

The vehicles were judged on technical, design and emission parameters before being put to static and dynamic tests. Participating teams were also required to present expenditure details — the ISM ATV rolled out in three months and at a cost of Rs 1.5 lakh — that were evaluated on the spot by highly qualified professionals.

The one-of-its-kind competition provides students a world-class opportunity to simulate real-world engineering.

The ISM vehicle like the one prepared by MIT, Aurangabad, survived severe punishment of rough terrain.

Buoyed by the achievement, Ashutosh Pandey, a final-year student said they would undertake more such projects in the near future. "We worked really hard for the past three months, often staying back late at the institute workshop. We didn't even take our Durga Puja break and completed the project in time."

Notably, this ATV is the second developed by ISM. In January 2009, the ISM team had flaunted a prototype at the same meet organised by Society of Automobile Engineers (SAE).

Faculty member N.K. Singh guided the students in both projects.

The ATV team was divided into small groups and each was assigned a separate task. "It was team work that paid rich dividend," said Vinay Chaudhary, a final-year student who was part of the design team.source

It's not the world's first electric car, but the Nissan Leaf, launched in August, is the first fully electric vehicle built for mass production for the global market. To help drivers shift their thinking from gas to green, Japan's third largest automaker has about 30 partnerships worldwide focused on developing an infrastructure of battery-recharging stations to keep electric vehicles on the roads. The car's top speed is more than 90 m.p.h. (145 km/h), and its range is 100 miles (160 km) on a full charge. When it moves, it makes a futuristic sound like the flying cars in Blade Runner. Nissan will produce 50,000 Leafs each year at its Oppama plant,

The Custom Puppy

In 1997, the year scientists announced they had created Dolly the cloned sheep, Lou Hawthorne began wondering what it would take to create a genetic replica of his mother's dog Missy. In 2007, his company BioArts did it, and in 2009, Hawthorne delivered puppies to five customers who paid an average of $144,000 for copies of their canines. (The company also created, pro bono, five clones of a search-and-rescue dog that worked at the World Trade Center after 9/11.) BioArts has since said the pet-cloning market is too small to be commercially viable, but for pet owners who jumped at the chance for a second chance, the puppy love lives on.

The Cyborg Beetle

Man has yet to master nature, but now he can make it turn left. Armed with funding from the Pentagon's research wing, an engineering team at the University of California, Berkeley, has devised a method of remotely controlling the flight of beetles. By attaching radio antennas and embedding electrodes in the insects' optic lobes, flight muscles and brains, professors Michel Maharbiz and Hirotaka Sato can manipulate their subjects into taking off, hovering in midair and turning on command. The trick? Wirelessly delivering jolts to a microbattery fastened to a circuit board atop the hapless insects, whose agility and capacity to tote valuable payloads could make the tiny creatures the ultimate fly on the wall.

The Biotech Stradivarius

On Sept. 1, an audience of experts took part in a blind test of five violins. One of the violins was a $2 million Stradivarius, made in 1711 by the greatest stringed-instrument maker of all time. Another was a modern violin made of wood that had been specially treated by Professor Francis Schwarze of the Swiss Federal Laboratory for Materials Testing and Research. Schwarze used two fungi to alter Norwegian spruce and sycamore to closely resemble the wood Stradivarius used, then commissioned a violin maker to build an instrument with them. The listeners were asked to identify the Strad, and 113 picked Schwarze's violin. The actual Stradivarius got only 39 votes.

One theory has it that Stradivarius' violins sound better because the craftsman lived in a brief climatic period that produced particularly high-quality wood.source

Sir James Dyson will today unveil his latest invention, The Air Multiplier, a desktop fan which has no blades.

The Air Multiplier promises to be 15 times more efficient than a standard fan, despite its lack of blades.

As well as being more efficient, it "is dead easy to clean," said Sir James.

The Air Multiplier marks a departure for Sir James, being the first new product category his company has moved into since the creation of the Airblade, a hand dryer that hit the market three years ago.

"I am very proud. We've been working on this for four years," he said.

The gadget will cost £199 and will initially be available in upmarket department stores and design shops, before it is sold via the Argos catalogue next year. This is significantly more expensive than the average price for a standard desk fan with blades, which is £18 in Britain.

However, Dyson is confident that the design – a large ring of plastic on top of a pedestal – and technology is radical enough to persuade people to spend extra on the product.

The Air Multiplier works by sucking in one unit of air at the base, and pushing it out at speed through a thin gap in the fan's ring. The expelled air is pushed out over an airfoil-shaped ramp (similar in shape the wing of an aeroplane). In doing so, surrounding air is drawn into the air flow, so by the time the cool air hits an office worker's face, it is the equivalent of 15 units of air.

In all, 405 litres of air are expelled every second.

However, Sir James insists it is not just more efficient than a standard fan – which expels one unit of air for every one taken in – it also creates a far smoother airflow.

"Normal fans chop up the air with the blade, which is very uncomfortable when you are sitting in front of a fan. It buffets you. This is far smoother."

Dyson hopes that while the market for fans in Britain is relatively small, America, Australia and Japan will snap up the device.

Sir James, who made his fortune and reputation thanks to his bagless vacuum cleaners, confirmed he would gladly work for a Conservative government if they won the general election.

"I am keen to promote engineering and technology in any capacity," he said, but hinted he might not actually become a minister. Asked if he would sit on the Conservative or cross-benches if he was offered a peerage, he said: "I have always been apolitical."

The fans will be made in Malaysia, as all of Dyson's products now are. "But, crucially, they will be exported from Britain," said Sir James. "We do all our research and development in Wiltshire, and we pay taxes here." source:The Telegraph UK